


Dear John

by clear_sight



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Angst, Spoilers, Suicide, post-TRF
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-05-15
Updated: 2012-05-17
Packaged: 2017-11-05 09:52:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,149
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/405083
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/clear_sight/pseuds/clear_sight
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sherlock looked up from the handwritten letter he held in trembling fingers to fix his brother with a desperate stare.  "No..."</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Catalyst

_Sherlock,_

_I have no idea what I’m doing writing this.  I know you’ll never read it.  I know you’re gone.  God, it hurts to write that.  I guess I’m doing this for my therapist.  She’s been wanting me to write you a letter to tell you all the things I wish I had before ~~you~~ what happened.  I don’t think this is what she had in mind, but I thought since, well, I just thought I’d do this one last thing.  But there _ were _things I wanted to tell you.  And I suppose I want Lestrade and Harry to understand, too._

 _I came to realize after everything that you meant so much more to me than just a friend.  I’m not sure exactly what that made you to me, but I miss you.  You made my life so much more interesting.  You made_ me _so much more interesting.  You made my life worth something again.  I wasn’t doing very well before you, as I’m sure you deduced.  No work, no friends, just my army pension and my depressingly tan bedsit.  And my bloody cane and my therapist.  I thought about this then.  I’m glad I didn’t.  I would never have met you._

 _When I lost you, though, I can’t go back.  I can’t be what I was.  It’s killing me, Sherlock.  Mrs. Hudson offered to let me stay in 221B, you know.  She misses you too.  I couldn’t stay there.  There’s too much_ you _there.  I moved back to the godforsaken tan bedsit for a bit, but I couldn’t stay there, either.  I’ve moved around a lot since then.  I couldn’t find anywhere I could stand for more than a week._

_It’s been two years and three months since it happened.  Two years and three months exactly.  I’ve kept count.  I know that sounds pathetic and sentimental, but then you would probably think this whole letter sounds pathetic and sentimental.  If you are up there somewhere, you’ll know for yourself how many times I slept at your grave.  Some days I just couldn’t leave.  I didn’t want to be away from you._

_I’m going to go to Bart’s today.  It seemed appropriate.  Well, as appropriate as anything else.  I can’t stand this anymore.  It’s time I finally put all of this behind me._

_Goodbye, Sherlock.  God willing I’ll see you again._

_Sincerely yours,_

_John H. Watson_

It was with wide eyes that Sherlock looked up from the handwritten letter he held in trembling fingers to fix his brother with a desperate stare.  But Mycroft’s face remained determinedly impassive.  He was hiding something, holding something back.  No one else would be able to tell except Sherlock, who had known him long enough to read the minute tightening of his jaw, the way his eyes were just slightly more downcast than normal, the way his fingers shifted on the handle of his omnipresent black umbrella.

“No.”  Sherlock’s tone was more desperate than anything Mycroft had ever heard from him.  There was almost a note of begging to it.

“I’m afraid so,” Mycroft replied sadly.  “That is why I called you back to England on such short notice.”

 _“No,”_ Sherlock snarled back.  This couldn’t be happening.

Mycroft ignored him, continuing on quietly.  “It happened two days ago.  I contacted you as quickly as possible.  He jumped from the roof of Saint Bart’s, exactly where you did.  We found that letter on your grave later that day.”

“NO!”  With that Sherlock was up, pacing furiously back and forth across the thick carpet of Mycroft’s study.  His mind raced, churning up images of John dead on the pavement alongside theories about reasons John might have faked his own death just the way Sherlock had faked his.

The elder Holmes watched his brother in silence.  There was nothing he could say right now that would calm Sherlock.  It really was a pity.  He had liked John, and not just for his good influence on his little brother.  John had been a good man.  He had been a good friend to Sherlock, and Mycroft appreciated that perhaps more than had John been one of his own friends.  Unfortunately, Sherlock’s “death” had been too much for the man.  He was already dealing with so much trauma.  So much loss.  He had had no one before Sherlock and, despite the efforts of his sister and Greg as well as Mycroft’s own efforts, after Sherlock he felt he had no one again.  He had felt there was nothing left.  And really, what was there after life with Sherlock Holmes?  If one could stomach it to begin with, then surely there was nothing to compare to it.  But John had more of an appreciation for Sherlock than just his work.  John had honestly liked Sherlock as a human being – not something that happened often.

Mycroft had tried for the first year to convince Sherlock to tell John he was alive.  Of course, he had known why Sherlock had refused.  But Sherlock didn’t see John every week.  Sherlock never saw firsthand how each passing week seemed to age the man another year.  Mycroft had finally convinced him to seek help, but there had been little else he could do.  Sherlock had insisted John was strong enough to carry on without him, something which Mycroft could tell by his expression he was torturing himself for now.

“The fall broke his neck,” Mycroft said finally.  It was barely more than a whisper, but it stopped Sherlock in his tracks.  “He died instantly.  He didn’t suffer.”

Mycroft politely pretended not to notice the tears streaming down his brother’s face.  Holmeses didn’t cry.  They were not emotionally inclined and they most certainly did not weep over the passing of others, never mind that Mycroft had already shed what few tears he would allow himself over John.  He had become quite attached to the man over the last two years.

“If you need to talk…”  The offer hung unspoken in the air.  Mycroft would act as therapist for his brother if it was necessary.  He would do anything necessary to keep the younger man safe and healthy.  Happy was too much to hope for.  Happy was something only John could manage.

As with the tears, he politely pretended not to find Sherlock’s bolting from the room odd.  He knew the first thing his brother would do was seek out drugs to drown his emotions.  Mycroft would send Anthea to collect him in an hour or so.  Sherlock was not inclined toward suicide, as much as he got himself into potentially deadly situations, so Mycroft wasn’t worried about an overdose.  Sherlock was too smart to accidentally overdose.  Mycroft would allow him this.  Just tonight.  Because John had been Sherlock’s first and only friend, the only person Mycroft had ever known him to show any kind of affection toward, and it had been obvious that this had torn him apart.

With a sigh, he sent for Anthea.  There was no time for him to worry over recent events.  He would keep Sherlock with him tonight and try to get him to talk.  He wasn’t John.  That was the best he could do.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've been listening to Dear John by Styx all day. That's what inspired this. If you haven't heard it, you should go listen because it's very pretty, even if it is sad. And I know. More Reichenbach angst. But it is what it is.
> 
> I may or may not continue this with letters from Sherlock. This was kind of a spur of the moment "oh my god there's so much chaos going on atm, i need to write some angst stat" kind of thing. We'll see what happens. As usual, this hasn't been beta'd or Brit-picked, so feel free to point out any issues.
> 
> Disclaimer: I do not own Sherlock Holmes or the BBC program Sherlock.


	2. Funeral Wake

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sherlock's first letter to John after John's suicide.

_Dear John,_

_I know you’ll never read these, but Mycroft has talked me into writing them.  He says it’ll be good for me.  I doubt it._

_Your funeral was today.  I couldn’t go, of course.  Not as myself.  It felt wrong, being there in a disguise.  Harry spoke.  She seemed much fonder of you than you described, but then people often do when the subject of those affections has died.  Lestrade cried when he gave his speech.  I’ve never seen him cry, but he was fond of you.  He liked you because you could make me behave.  More than that, though, he liked you because you were honest and brave and loyal and a good friend.  Mycroft has told me he would have spoken had he not thought it would anger you._

_Lestrade was right, John.  You were a truly incredible friend.  I had never had a friend before you.  Not a real one – someone who wasn’t just using me as an end to a means.  I never told you about university.  After Lestrade’s fake drugs bust I couldn’t bear to disappoint you like that again.  And that is what I mean about you.  I don’t care what people think about me.  I don’t care what_ anyone _thinks about me, much to my brother’s dismay.  You were the exception.  You were always the exception._

_I know I made you think that I thought you were an idiot, that you couldn’t keep up, that you were inadequate.  It was always quite the opposite, John.  I never thought you were stupid.  Never.  Perhaps when I first met you I might have thought you were quite ordinary and, yes, perhaps a bit stupid in the way most ordinary people are.  You proved me wrong before I had known you for even two days.  You were really quite extraordinary, John._

_I hoped that in a few months (that is all it should take me to finish clearing away Moriarty’s web) I could come home.  To you.  I could explain what I had done and why and we could go back to our lives.  I had been afraid you would be angry with me.  I know you don’t like when I’m dishonest.  I honestly hadn’t anticipated this._

_I really thought you were strong enough to move on, John.  Not that I think you weren’t strong.  Mycroft has told me about what happened to you during the two and a quarter years after my apparent suicide.  Really I should have seen it coming.  I knew about the PTSD and the psychosomatic limp and the intermittent tremor.  I knew you weren’t doing well when we first met.  It didn’t take me long to realize you had considered suicide before.  It was written all over the way you held yourself on days when we’d nothing to do during those first few months.  But the John I knew by the end of our time together I thought was unbreakable.  I should have heeded Mycroft’s warnings and let you know I was alive.  I was afraid I would put you at risk if I did._

_I don’t know what I’ll do when I finish hunting down the last of Moriarty’s people.  I can’t come back to Baker Street after this.  Mycroft has offered to place me somewhere, like if I were in witness protection.  I don’t think it would work – your blog made my face too recognizable – but I have been tempted._

_I don’t really have anything else to say on the matter.  I do suppose this letter has been beneficial.  I don’t typically let my feelings get so under my skin, so to speak.  I try to keep them as distant as possible so that they don’t interfere with my work.  If I would have you know one thing, John, it is that I miss you.  I have missed you since my “death.”  You were never ordinary to me, John._

_Sincerely yours,_

_Sherlock Holmes_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is short and has no context outside of Sherlock talking about John's funeral, but I think most of these chapters will be that way. A lot of them will probably be letters, although a few might be text or letters and text. I think it works better to just leave the letters to stand on their own.  
> As usual, not beta'd or Brit-picked.


	3. Grievances

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A letter from Mycroft.

_Dearest John,_

_I am quite aware that you were cross with me right up to the very end.  And I will give you that it was my lack of thinking that forced Sherlock’s hand.  But I will have you know that I helped him arrange his faked suicide.  You never could have known that in life._

_Whatever you thought of me, John, I was rather fond of you.  I liked you from the beginning, because you were good for my brother and what helps Sherlock makes me happy as that is something I am mostly incapable of myself.  But after his death, when I actually got to know you, I was fond of you.  Perhaps you wouldn’t understand why.  You were typically short with me when you weren’t having a breakdown.  But I understood.  You were angry that it was my fault my brother was dead.  You did care for him so much._

_You were a good man, John.  You were a credit to Her Majesty’s forces.  Most of all, however, you were the making of my brother.  Before you he was broken, lost.  You put him back together.  There is no way, nor would there ever have been, that I could thank you for that._

_There is little else I can really say.  The time I spent with you was pleasant.  You were never intimidated by me and that is so rare a thing anymore.  I will sorely miss your company for your slow judgment and your lack of fear.  As you learned from Sherlock, we Holmeses don’t acquire many friends._

_I have convinced Sherlock to write to you as well.  He is holding up as well as can be expected.  He has turned to drugs, but I am doing my best to keep him otherwise occupied._

_Sincerely,_

_Mycroft Holmes_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Very short one this time. I knew I wanted to do one from Mycroft, but there wasn't a whole lot to put in it. Also, since I've been updating this roughly daily I feel a little less bad about the shortness. They are letters, after all.  
> As per usual, not beta'd or Brit-picked.


End file.
